Colonialism in Modern America is a series of essays exploring the economic and social problems of the region within the context of colonialism. It is a relatively simple task to document the social ills and the environmental ravage that beset the people and land of Appalachia. However, it is far more difficult and problematic to uncover the causes of these tragic conditions.

Empire of the Senses brings together pathbreaking scholarship on the role the five senses played in early America. With perspectives from across the hemisphere, exploring individual senses and multi-sensory frameworks, the volume explores how sensory perception helped frame cultural encounters, colonial knowledge, and political relationships. From early French interpretations of intercultural touch, to English plans to restructure the scent of Jamaica, these essays elucidate different ways the expansion of rival European empires across the Americas involved a vast interconnected range of sensory experiences and practices. Empire of the Senses offers a new comparative perspective on the way European imperialism was constructed, operated, implemented and, sometimes, counteracted by rich and complex new sensory frameworks in the diverse contexts of early America. This book has been listed on the Books of Note section on the website of Sensory Studies, which is dedicated to highlighting the top books in sensory studies: www.sensorystudies.org/books-of-note

A startling exposé of the CIA's development and spread of psychological torture, from the Cold War to Abu Ghraib and beyond In this revelatory account of the CIA's secret, fifty-year effort to develop new forms of torture, historian Alfred W. McCoy uncovers the deep, disturbing roots of recent scandals at Abu Ghraib and Guantánamo. Far from aberrations, as the White House has claimed, A Question of Torture shows that these abuses are the product of a long-standing covert program of interrogation. Developed at the cost of billions of dollars, the CIA's method combined "sensory deprivation" and "self-inflicted pain" to create a revolutionary psychological approach—the first innovation in torture in centuries. The simple techniques—involving isolation, hooding, hours of standing, extremes of hot and cold, and manipulation of time—constitute an all-out assault on the victim's senses, destroying the basis of personal identity. McCoy follows the years of research—which, he reveals, compromised universities and the U.S. Army—and the method's dissemination, from Vietnam through Iran to Central America. He traces how after 9/11 torture became Washington's weapon of choice in both the CIA's global prisons and in "torture-friendly" countries to which detainees are dispatched. Finally McCoy argues that information extracted by coercion is worthless, making a case for the legal approach favored by the FBI. Scrupulously documented and grippingly told, A Question of Torture is a devastating indictment of inhumane practices that have spread throughout the intelligence system, damaging American's laws, military, and international standing.

At the end of the nineteenth century the United States swiftly occupied a string of small islands dotting the Caribbean and Western Pacific, from Puerto Rico and Cuba to Hawaii and the Philippines. Colonial Crucible: Empire in the Making of the Modern American State reveals how this experiment in direct territorial rule subtly but profoundly shaped U.S. policy and practice—both abroad and, crucially, at home. Edited by Alfred W. McCoy and Francisco A. Scarano, the essays in this volume show how the challenge of ruling such far-flung territories strained the U.S. state to its limits, creating both the need and the opportunity for bold social experiments not yet possible within the United States itself. Plunging Washington’s rudimentary bureaucracy into the white heat of nationalist revolution and imperial rivalry, colonialism was a crucible of change in American statecraft. From an expansion of the federal government to the creation of agile public-private networks for more effective global governance, U.S. empire produced far-reaching innovations. Moving well beyond theory, this volume takes the next step, adding a fine-grained, empirical texture to the study of U.S. imperialism by analyzing its specific consequences. Across a broad range of institutions—policing and prisons, education, race relations, public health, law, the military, and environmental management—this formative experience left a lasting institutional imprint. With each essay distilling years, sometimes decades, of scholarship into a concise argument, Colonial Crucible reveals the roots of a legacy evident, most recently, in Washington’s misadventures in the Middle East.

A comprehensive collection of primary documents for students of early American and Atlantic history, Colonial North America and the Atlantic World gives voice to the men and women¿Amerindian, African, and European¿who together forged a new world.These compelling narratives address the major themes of early modern colonialism from the perspective of the people who lived at the time: Spanish priests and English farmers, Indian diplomats and Dutch governors, French explorers and African abolitionists. Evoking the remarkable complexity created by the bridging of the Atlantic Ocean, Colonial North America and the Atlantic World suggests that the challenges of globalization¿and the growing reality of American diversity¿are among the most important legacies of the colonial world.